Sinister Things Going On At Our House

We live in this really old beat up antique house. It's an old farmhouse, soon 200 years old. We've done a tremendous amount of work on this house- nothing fancy or elaborate mind you, just trying to get it up to date. Have you wired a 200 year old house for modern living, which includes Internet and more than one outlet per room? Shesh! One thing, however, (OK, not the only thing) that we have not been able to change about this house since we became the current caretakers...

Photo by Augusta Serno via Flickr

... are the mice. That's just the way it is in an old house out in the country in the middle of a horse field. They love the Internet, by the way.

We did get the Sexy Psycho Serial Killer of a cat that first spring in the house and she truly was a prolific hunter in her younger days. Now she's a casual hunter. But she lives outside, which doesn't help us too much inside, and the Chihuahua, well...

... great as he was he had issues.

We used to set out traps and every morning we would "run the trap line" collecting carcases. Sorry if that offends any of you but please don't suggest we use no-kill traps or send mean emails. Trust me, the world will not run out of mice. I'm not even going to tell you the record for most mice in one day, set soon after we moved in, because it would make us look like Ben and Willard. It's just a farmhouse thing. Once, before the third floor was finished and we used the bedroom closet up there strictly as a closet but hadn't moved into that bedroom yet, I discovered one of my boots half full of dog food. Dog food is on the first floor, not the third. And that fringe on the rug in the computer room?

Oh well, who needs fringe? We trapped mostly in the fall and winter, spring and summers weren't so bad. And since we have acquired Remy the Rat Terrier...




(Seen here listening for the mouse to squeak again)



... the vermin haven't been around so much. We hear them scrambling in the walls in mid-winter but rarely see them any more. So you can imagine my surprise to find signs of mouse activity.

My husband and I each have a basket under our respective bedside tables for our Books-To-Read collections.

OK, I have two baskets but that's not the point. As I was cleaning up around there the other day, I discovered signs of nefarious activity.

Mmm huh-- chewing activity. And then something got stuck in the vacuum cleaner nozzle.

And then I found her, lurking under the bedskirt.

I don't play with Legos and Zippy is not allowed to haul her Legos up to our room. I mean, have you stepped on one of those things in the middle of the night in bare feet? So how did she get there? What would a sweet damsel, usually in such fun distress on the Lego Pirate ship, be doing in my bedroom?

You don't suppose there's something besides mice scurrying about in the night, do you? You don't suppose there's something much more sinister going on...

... like maybe they're nibbling away at my book basket in revenge for vacuuming up all their friends.

Oh that would hurt me deep. Maybe I should lay off the jokes about needing more vacuum cleaner bags every time Zippy gets more Legos.

And now- true confessions time. Half way through shooting the pictures for this post, I totally got it. I totally got why my Zippy loves Legos. They are really fun to play with. Yes, that makes me some kind of Lego Geek and the Nerd Quotient is already pretty high in our house. So be it. But honestly, you should give Legos a crack one afternoon when no one is home. Just be sure to get them all put away in the right place or Somebody is going to want to know, like the proverbial Goldilocks, "Who's been playing with my Legos?"